19 who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.
Having abandoned God, non-Christians can reach a point where they practice any and every form of uncleanness with greed as their motivation.
to [with a view to] work [practice] all uncleanness
Gentiles enter into reckless behavior with a deliberate view to do any category of sin they can find. They end with a decadent lifestyle.
The word “work” means to practice. These people make a habit of practicing “uncleanness.”
with greediness [covetousness].
“Greediness” is uninhibited lusts and covetousness. “Uncleanness” gets to the point where it becomes avid about being sinful. Greed is the problem of never having enough.
PRINCIPLE:
People can reach a point of decadent behavior by greed orientation toward uncleanness.
APPLICATION:
Western society is becoming more and more decadent. It is a culture where pornography runs rampant. Television controls thought patterns of north American culture with increasing permissiveness.
Unbounded greed becomes uninhibited in immorality. It is a lifestyle that takes rather than gives, that is self-centered rather than centered on others. These people concern themselves only with what they want rather than what they can give. This kind of greed is what the Bible calls idolatry.
Co 3:5, Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.
When a person determines to think in his own way, do things his own way, and pursue his own destiny, he cuts himself off from God. When that happens, he removes himself from truth and becomes spiritually blind and without standards of morality. Immorality then becomes a shameless and calloused way of life. When that continues, it destroys the mind’s ability to distinguish good from evil and truth from a lie. This is the destiny toward which those without Christ are headed.
